The Daily Grind with Matt Clarke

To Limp or Not to Limp

Written by Matt Clarke | April 10, 2026

 My good friend Roger, out in Portland, Oregon, told me some time back to never trust a leader without a limp. Meaning if there is a leader who fails to acknowledge their faults, failures, or screw-ups, they are a phony. Nobody wants to follow someone who thinks they are perfect. 

That is great news for me as I have a lingering limp, literally. I remember when I pulled a calf muscle, and it just would not get better. (Well, actually, I was just too stubborn or stupid to do what it takes to allow it to heal). I went out for a run, and a short while into it, I had an idea for something I wanted to write about. So, I stopped, sat down, and spent a little time writing on my phone. When I was done, I hopped up and started running again. When I did, I noticed that my right leg felt like it was asleep, and as I was thinking about how strange that was...POP! There goes my calf. As I limped back to the house, I was frustrated with myself at just how dumb I was not to have stretched or at least started back up slowly, walking for a minute to warm back up.

Why do we jump into things without first properly preparing? And why do we do it over and over again?

Muhammad Ali once said, “The fight is won or lost far away from witnesses - behind the lines, in the gym and out there on the road, long before I dance under those lights.”

  It is in the preparation and work behind the scenes that we win or lose, not on the stage or in the ring. 

The studying before the test, the research before the phone call, the practice before the speech, the analysis before the decision, I learned at a firearms class that shooting from the hip is a very dangerous technique because you cannot be sure of what you are going to hit, and you are responsible for every shot.

The Bible says, "But don't begin until you count the cost. For who would begin construction of a building without first calculating the cost to see if there is enough money to finish it? Otherwise, you might complete only the foundation before running out of money, and then everyone would laugh at you. They would say, 'There's the person who started that building and couldn't afford to finish it!"' (Luke 14:28-30)

Practice, study, budget. Do the road work, be prepared and stretch....or limp like me for a few weeks or months and wish that you had.
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